


Honeymoon Horror

by Mask_Maker_907



Category: Dragon Ball
Genre: Awkward Sexual Situations, ChiChi makes a spider friend, Constructive Criticism Welcome, F/M, Getting to Know Each Other, I'm Bad At Endings, No actual sex, Possession, Psudo Cannibalism, Spiders, Unreliable Narrator, an attempt at horror, but not really graphic, but only one, cliffhanger ending, missunderstandings, or does she, there is violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:48:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27306550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mask_Maker_907/pseuds/Mask_Maker_907
Summary: Marriage life isn't what Chi-Chi thought it'd be, but that doesn't mean she wont try to make the best of it. However after an argument and a strange night, Goku starts acting weird. It all culminates in the worst night of Chi-Chi's life and soon the question isn't whether or not she and Goku can live happily as a married couple, but if she can survive the night.
Relationships: Chi-Chi/Son Goku (Dragon Ball)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15





	Honeymoon Horror

This was it, their wedding night. Chi-Chi was nervous but Goku didn’t seem too bothered, probably because he was more interested in seeing if their new kitchen was stocked. Leaving Chi-Chi alone in their new bedroom.

The new bride was poking around in their room. Checking to see if everything was in its place and trying to distract herself from freaking out. She shouldn’t be freaking out though. Chi-Chi had wanted to be a housewife since she was old enough to know what it meant.

It was just that their wedding night was not something she could have practiced before. Well actually she could have, she just wouldn’t have been a very good bride if she had. More than that, most things she could use to educate herself about her wedding night were questionable at best. Her tutor, Ms. Matcha, had made certain that Chi-Chi knew that what books and magazines said were not what reality was like. Though the older woman hadn’t actually gone into much detail about what she _should_ expect, just that it wouldn’t be like most of what she’d read.

Given Goku’s misunderstanding of what a bride was, Chi-Chi figured he had as much experience with sex as she did. At least, she hoped he did, it’d mean they’d be on equal footing for this.

However, that thought did little to ease her nervousness, though thankfully it didn’t increase it. Still she found herself staring at her reflection in the mirror she had over her dresser, her still made up face frowning in thought. What could she do to make this the best night for Goku?

Unfortunately Chi-Chi didn’t know the answer to that.

She could admit, she didn’t really know her husband, having only gotten to know him for about a week considering that’s how long it took to put their wedding together and set up the house, her dad’s wedding gift to them. Less than a week actually, considering her dad kept taking him to help with the house. And that really wasn’t a long time, clearly not enough to know what he wanted in a woman.

Goku loved his food, his current kitchen raid was evidence of that, and he loved to spar, but Chi-Chi couldn’t imagine either of those translating to bedroom activities well at all. Well, she knew some people did it with food involved but that always seemed messy and gross to her. Goku might like it but it was not something she wanted for her wedding night.

Refocusing on her reflection, she bit her lip and began undoing the ties of her wedding dress. Her stomach was twisting with nerves. No one had ever seen her bare before, Goku would be the first and only one; what if he didn’t like how she looked? What if she did something he didn’t like? What if she offended him? Or touched him in the wrong place?

A part of her wanted to put off being so intimate with Goku. At least until she was surer of what Goku wanted and how he’d react. However Ms. Matcha and her father had been adamant that while they were married legally, they wouldn’t be considered married spiritually until they’d consummated their marriage. And that part was just as important as being married legally was, if not more so considering she now knew Goku was friends with _Kami_ , of all people. That meant she absolutely couldn’t mess it up. It’d be bad enough if his best friends thought she wasn’t a good match for Goku. It’d be even worse if Kami, the _Kami_ , disapproved of her.

Chi-Chi stopped what she was doing, closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. She let it go, pushing her doubts out with the air before opening her eyes again. She couldn’t think about things like that, she shouldn’t at least. This was about her and Goku. _Only_ about her and Goku. Whatever else her tutor had taught her, Chi-Chi’s job as a wife was to please her husband. And that’s what she’d do, no matter what doubts she may have.

With determination and a calm she didn’t quite feel Chi-Chi once more began undressing herself. This time starting with taking the pins out of her hair and letting it flow freely. It was, of course, around then when Goku finally joined her in the bedroom.

“That food was great!”

She squashed down her nerves and glanced back at him, Goku was looking around the room. “Is there anything left for tomorrow?” Chi-Chi wasn’t sure how she managed to say that so easily. Especially with most of her thoughts preoccupied with what will happen soon on the bed not too far away from the both of them.

He laughed, “of course! Your dad gave us enough food to last a few days.” Her dad had probably given them enough food to last for longer than that, likely enough to last a few weeks, but it was astonishingly easy to underestimate Goku’s stomach. It was then that he noticed her half-dressed state. “Oh! Can I get out of this stuffy suit?”

“Yeah, if you want,” she’d barely finished talking before Goku was stripped down to his boxers. Chi-Chi froze again as she took in the sight of her barely clothed husband.

“Ah, sorry Chi-Chi, did you want me to leave?”

“N-no! It’s fine, we’re married so that’s okay.”

“What does being married have to do with anything?”

“We-well, married couples can see each other naked.”

He tilted his head to the side in confusion. “Really? Alright then, but I don’t feel like getting naked right now. This is fine.”

She let out a small breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. That was fine. Chi-Chi wasn’t too sure she could deal with seeing _that_ just yet. Maybe after they’d started kissing each other the idea of a completely naked Goku wouldn’t be so intimidating. She forced herself to continue undressing while Goku exclaimed at how nice their bed was. It felt like forever before she turned off the lights and joined him.

Like with Goku, she was wearing little more than her underwear, though it was much lacier and nicer looking than the kind she normally wore. She got into bed around the time Goku finished settling in.

“This’ll be nice. It’s been a while since I’ve slept with anyone. I’ve missed it.”

“Um, well, that’s good. I’ve never actually slept with anyone before, other than my dad once or twice.” She licked her lips in nervousness; now was as good a time as any. “A-anyway, sleep isn’t all married couples do in bed.”

He turned to look at her. “It isn’t? What else do they do?”

“Um, sex.” Despite herself, she whispered that word. He didn’t say anything for a moment and Chi-Chi wasn’t actually sure he heard her. “Married couples, they, uh, have sex. Together. In bed. With each other.” She peeked at him through her loose hair to see his reaction, praying to Kami that she wouldn’t have to explain what sex was. As it was, Chi-Chi didn’t think her face would ever go back to its normal color considering how flushed it’d gotten.

He’d returned to laying on his back and was staring at the ceiling in thought, a small frown on his face. “Right. Sex. Master Roshi taught me about that.” She let out another small breath of relief, at least he wasn’t _that_ innocent. “He never said anything about marriage though.”

“We-well, that’s… Some people like to have sex without being married. I, however, was raised to only have sex with my husband.”

“Huh, alright. I think I get it.” He turned back towards her, sitting up a little this time. “So you want to do that?”

“Ye-yeah, that’s what we’re supposed to do, so…”

“Okay.”

They lapsed into silence, staring at each other. Chi-Chi was a blushing mess but Goku didn’t seem affected at all by the tension she felt, or by the intimidating idea that they’d soon be intimate with each other. A bead of sweat rolled down her face as she mentally willed Goku to make the first move. To lean forward and kiss her, to touch her, to do something at least!

Instead he sheepishly smiled. “So, what do we do first? Master Roshi never really talked about that part.”

“He- he didn’t?” Did he not know as much as she thought he did?

“Nah, he’d always get all red faced- kind of like you, actually- and start making grabby motions with his hands. His books didn’t really help much either.” Goku shrugged, “they’d be talking and then they’d start having sex, but that doesn’t seem right, somehow.” He frowned and shifted. “I know my peepee is supposed to be hard for this, but it’s not right now, should we wait?”

Despite how nervous she was, Chi-Chi kind of wanted to laugh. It was somehow both fitting and cute to hear him talk about his manhood in such a childish way. Instead she steeled her nerves. “I- I think I can help with that,” she motioned him to lay back down and moved to straddle his waist.

She wiggled a bit when she finished climbing on him, trying to find a comfortable position for the both of them and, admittedly shamelessly, used the opportunity to run her hands over his chest. It was a good chest, solid like a rock and with little hair on it. Goku didn’t actually have a lot of hair, from what she could see, other than the obvious mop on his head.

She found what felt like a decent place to settle and stopped moving; Goku made a noise in the back of his throat. “Are you okay? Should I move?” Was she messing it up already?

“Uh, no, that- that felt kind of nice, before you stopped.” It looked like the tips of his ears were starting to turn red, though it was hard to tell with only the waxing moon to see by. The skin under his eyes was certainly darker than it had been before though.

“So, you want me to keep,” she shifted her hips and she was very certain that his answering grunt was in agreement.

“Could you move a little lower though? Yeah, like that. That feels good.” His voice was getting deeper, that was a good sign, right?

Chi-Chi was starting to feel good too. It might have been because of her motions or the friction of her sensitive area against his hardening crotch, but sparks of pleasure were starting to build up inside her. All the while her hands kept wandering, tracing his startlingly pronounced muscles and exploring all the small, almost invisible, scars that were scattered over his skin.

“Chi-Chi, this is sex, isn’t it?”

“Ki-kind of? We’d have to be naked for sex though, and you’d be inside me.”

“Right, cause girls have holes.”

“Ye-yeah.” She shifted a bit more and nibbled on her lip. “Do- do you want to get undressed now?”

“I don’t know. This feels nice so far but… I don’t know.” He certainly sounded unsure. Was he supposed to be doing anything? Goku was just lying under her, looking as lost and confused as she felt.

“Do you want me to take my bra off? Or do you want to touch me or anything?”

“No, I think I’m fine like this.”

“Okay. Um, can I touch you?”

This got her a raised brow. “I thought you were already touching me?”

“N-no, I mean like, um…” She shifted her hands lower, brushing against the top of his boxers before she moved them back up, pressing more firmly than she had before. She also moved her hands up further, till she was practically laying on him. Her fingers gently traced the muscles and tendons in his neck. “You know, intimately.”

“Oh.” He still sounded unsure, and he tilted his head away from her fingers. Did that mean he wanted her to stop? Should she stop? Chi-Chi ran her hands back down his body, paying attention to every twitch and movement he made. She scooted down a little more so that she had better access to his lower area.

She wasn’t sure if it was because of her hands or the way she moved her body, but Goku let out a noise that sounded like a combination of a groan and a growl that sent shivers up her spine. It sounded like he enjoyed that so she pressed on. However, she didn’t manage to do much more than slip her fingers under the elastic of his underwear before Goku spoke up again.

“Chi-Chi, wait,” he panted out. “Do we have- do we have to keep going?”

His question caused her to pause. “Do you _want_ to keep going?” She thought he was enjoying what she was doing. His body was certainly responding to her if the firmness under her was any indication.

Goku let out a strangled whine. “No? It feels good- really good- but it’s also… a lot?” He squirmed under her and it was only now that Chi-Chi noticed how tense he was; his hands were fisted into the sheets and from what she could feel his legs seemed ready to spring up and move. “It’s different and weird.”

They weren’t supposed to stop once they got started. They weren’t supposed to even question having sex on their wedding night. Goku wasn’t supposed to hesitate and she wasn’t supposed to let him. Chi-Chi had fully expected him, as a man, to be eager and willing to do anything to keep going. The fact that he was hesitating was kind of scary; did that mean she was doing it wrong? Or that maybe she wasn’t the kind of woman he wanted? What could she do to change that?

She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Her job, she reminded herself, as a wife was to please her husband. “Goku,” she started, moving her hands to his stomach, hopefully a safer area for them to rest on so that maybe he’d feel more comfortable. “Sex is supposed to feel good, during and afterwards. If we keep going, do you think it’ll feel good for you?”

He grimaced, “honestly, it _does_ feel good. But I don’t feel like I’m in control of myself. And I really don’t like that.”

She could probably push more, convince him that it’d be fine, that he’d just need to do it a bit so that he see he was in control of himself. That it’d only take practice before he stopped feeling that way.

However, her father had once told her, regardless of whatever Ms. Matcha said, that if she was at all ever uncertain of having sex with someone, even her own husband, she should say no. That if she said no and he didn’t stop it’d be a terrible crime to her.

Goku was uncertain and, directly or not, he’d asked her to stop. He’d said no. Even if he hadn’t actually said the words, he had still meant them. To push him, to continue on when he was unsure, would be a terrible crime to him.

It was tradition to have sex on the night of their wedding. They wouldn’t be considered married in spirit if they didn’t consummate it. To not do so would mean she’d failed as a wife. Ms. Matcha had been very clear on that; that she’d have to entice her husband to be intimate with her and failure to do so meant she was lacking as both a wife and as her student.

Her success, however, was not worth Goku’s uncertainty. So Chi-Chi nodded and moved off of him. He made a small noise of surprise but he also seemed to relax a bit. “If you’re not sure, than the answer’s no.” Despite that, she couldn’t help but cuddle close to him, thankfully he didn’t tense up again.

Instead he closed his eyes and began to breathe deeply. Was he trying to go to sleep already? Or was he just trying to ignore her? Should she back off a bit more? “Goku?” His only response was a distracted hum. He didn’t even want to talk to her, did he? They’d only gotten married a couple hours ago; did she completely ruin their marriage already? “Do you want me to move away a bit?”

“Oh, no. Sorry. I was just trying to make myself calm down and get rid of that.” He gestured to the now rather prominent bulge in his underwear. “It’s a lot easier to sleep without it all hard like that, you know?”

“I suppose so.” Chi-Chi would have to take his word for it though. She half wanted to suggest letting her take care of it. Not with traditional sex, not after he’d said no to it, but maybe he’d be okay if she used her hands? But it didn’t feel right to suggest something like that. She didn’t want to push him any farther than she already had tonight.

More than that, it seemed like this was something he’d done quite a few times. “Do you dislike it when you’re hard like that?”

“Sometimes. It can get really distracting. And I don’t like that I can’t keep it from happening. Everyone I’ve talked to says it’s normal though, so,” he shrugged.

“I’ve heard that too.” If Goku disliked being aroused, then maybe he wouldn’t like sex at all. That might complicate things. How were they supposed to consummate their marriage and have children if Goku didn’t want to have sex?

Then again there was a thing she’d heard of where a doctor could get a woman pregnant without having sex with someone. Ms. Matcha had scoffed at that, saying it shouldn’t count because it wasn’t natural, but it could work. It didn’t solve the problem of consummating their marriage though.

“Do girls do that?” His question drew her out of her thoughts.

“What?”

“Do girls get hard like boys do?”

What kind of question was that? She almost didn’t want to answer. But he asked and maybe it might help him feel more comfortable with sex if he knew. “No, well, yes. Girls- women- don’t get hard but that area gets wet.”

Goku frowned, “like, with pee?”

“No!” He flinched at her sudden loud protest and she covered her face in embarrassment. “It’s not like that!” All the books she’d read had only described it as feeling wet though so she tried to remember what Ms. Matcha had said about it when she’d asked. “It’s something that’s slippery and makes it easier for your- your penis,” she whispered the word, “to go inside.”

“Oh.” He paused, frowning in thought. “Did… what we just do make you wet?”

Chi-Chi blinked at the question. Truth be told she’d become too focused on Goku to pay attention to her body, heck, she’d been too focused to even kiss him! However from what she could tell she did indeed feel a bit damp down there. But mostly she was warmer than usual and she wanted to stay close to Goku. “A little. I think it might be harder for girls? Sometimes?” It didn’t really happen to her a lot, and not even her romance novels seemed to go into a lot of detail on the girl’s side of things. Physically, at least, other than a vague description of an ‘aching need,’ and an ‘empty feeling,’ that is. “It easy enough to ignore though.”

“Heeh,” Goku whined, “lucky. I usually have to focus my ki in a certain way to make it stop.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” The question left her mouth before Chi-Chi could think about what she’d just offered. Hadn’t she just been thinking that she shouldn’t push his boundaries right now?

Luckily he didn’t seem to think about the more intimate ways she could take care of his arousal. Instead he sheepishly scratched the back of his neck. “Well, you could… promise not to get mad?”

“I won’t get mad.” Though what could he ask that would make her get angry? Chi-Chi highly doubted he’d ask her to please him with her hands, but that was the only thing she could think of him asking that would make her upset.

“Could you take a shower?”

“A… A shower?” She hadn’t been expecting that.

“Yeah, your smell’s kind of distracting.” Despite her assurance earlier, Chi-Chi did get a little angry at that. How dare he say that she smelled!

However, she had told Goku she wouldn’t get angry. So instead of scowling at him, she just nodded and left, grabbing a nightgown from the dresser as she passed. If they weren’t going to have sex, there was no need for her to stay mostly naked. Goku might feel better if there were more clothes between them as well. Chi-Chi knew _she’d_ feel more comfortable with more clothes on at least.

It was only when the door to the bathroom was shut that she recalled Ms. Matcha giving her some perfume at the wedding reception. This honestly wasn’t unusual, Ms. Matcha had a habit of making strange things with herbs and flowers and gifting them to others, though this was the first time her teacher had given her perfume. Her tutor had said that it’d help entice Goku and make their wedding night go smoothly. Chi-Chi had been so excited by that idea that she’d slipped into the bathroom and put it on before she and Goku had taken their leave. It’d smelled very herby and it wasn’t at all the kind of thing she’d normally use, but Ms. Matcha had been very adamant that it’d work so she’d dutifully dabbed it on her skin.

Chi-Chi couldn’t smell it anymore, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t still noticeable. Perhaps that was what was bothering Goku. On reflection, he hadn’t said that she’d smelled bad, just that the way she smelled was making it harder for him to take care of himself.

Smiling to herself, she tied her hair back and stepped into the shower; her mind on the small bottle she had stashed away in her underwear drawer. Maybe when he was more comfortable with the idea of having sex with her she’d bring it out again.

As it was only on a few parts of her, it didn’t take Chi-Chi long to clean herself. Still it didn’t surprise her that on leaving the bathroom, she found Goku sound asleep. Despite the awkward uncertainty that still lingered in her mind, she couldn’t help but smile at the sight of her husband sleeping. He looked so peaceful and calm. So unlike how he was when he fought against Piccolo not too long ago when he was nothing but fiercely determined and focused. He was as handsome then as he was now.

She kept staring at him as she settled down beside him. Chi-Chi couldn’t help it, there was something so enchanting about him. Especially under the moonlight. The way the shadows deepened his features and highlighted his muscles, how the light made his skin so pale it looked as if he was carved out of marble by a great artist. Even if he was starting to drool a little bit, that did little to diminish his beauty.

A large part of Chi-Chi still really wanted to touch him, to memorize his body with her hands as well as with her eyes. However that wouldn’t be right, not with him being so soundly asleep, and Chi-Chi wanted to do what was right for Goku. She wouldn’t be a good wife if she purposefully did something to hurt him, after all. 

Chi-Chi smiled to herself as she settled a bit more into the bed, thinking about her choice to marry him despite not knowing him as well as she perhaps should. While she’d known she wanted to be a wife for as long as she could remember, she’d wanted to be _Goku’s_ wife since the day they met. Perhaps it was a bit impulsive and hasty on her part, but Goku had been so cutely innocent and artlessly charming that she couldn’t help but commit herself to that promise of marriage.

She honestly could have dropped it a few years later when she’d learned about bad touches and how that didn’t mean she’d _have_ to get married, however Chi-Chi knew she and Goku would be good together like she knew that the sun would rise in the morning. She didn’t know why she felt so certain, but she wasn’t about to question that feeling. Ms. Matcha had always told her to listen to her instincts and heart as well as her head when it came to making decisions.

Her eyes drifted shut as she snuggled closer to Goku’s sleeping form. Thinking about Ms. Matcha reminded her that she’d failed in her duty as a wife to consummate their marriage, but honestly there was always tomorrow. After all, being married meant spending the rest of her life with Goku, what harm could waiting until they were both comfortable with each other possibly bring? It wasn’t like she could, or would, tell her tutor or her father that she’d had sex with her husband right away. Who would know if they waited?

With that thought she drifted off to sleep, eagerly awaiting getting to know her husband in the morning.

The next few days had allowed them to settle into something of a routine. Not that Chi-Chi minded in the least, considering the scramble to get the wedding together on a fairly short notice.

Everyday she’d rise with the sun. More often than not Goku would be up before her, but sometimes he wouldn’t wake until she’d gotten started on breakfast. No matter when he got up, she could count on him being at the table, begging for food before she’d finished cooking. She’d quickly gotten into the habit of serving up something quick and filling to tide him over while she cooked the bulk of their actual breakfast. Despite his seemingly bottomless stomach, he was sweet enough to save a little bit of everything for her. As soon as breakfast was over he’d go out training. Sometimes he’d come back for lunch, but most of the time he ate whatever he could find out in the wilderness.

He’d typically bring back something for her to cook up for dinner when he returned in the evening. It was usually fish or a boar, but sometimes he’d surprise her. Chi-Chi didn’t mind, it was usually a nice surprise and a challenge to figure out how to cook some of what he’d brought back. Not that he’d often needed to, considering how well stocked her father had left their kitchen. Still, the fresh meat wasn’t something she’d ever turn away, especially not with how proud and pleased Goku always looked whenever she’d accept the food he’d bring back.

The bulk of their getting to know each other was when she was making dinner and afterwards as they both wound down for the day. It was nice, having someone there to talk to while she was cooking and afterwards his company was soothing and comfortable in a way she hadn’t thought she’d ever feel in the presence of someone who wasn’t her father.

Their time together though only really served to highlight just how little she knew about her husband. Some of the new things she learned simply highlighted how cute and sweet he was, like when he brought back food or the fact that, regardless of how much he disliked reading he always seemed interested in the types of books she was reading from. Chi-Chi didn’t talk to him about the romance novels she had, but she didn’t mind retelling or outright re-reading her more adventure based books to him.

That didn’t mean that there wasn’t some discouraging things she’d found out about him. For instance, despite how much he seemed to enjoy eating, Goku didn’t seem to have a favorite food or even an actual sense of taste. While it was nice to be constantly complimented on her cooking; the fact that he’d say the same thing when eating something she’d clearly messed up on as he would when eating the best meal she’s ever made was… disheartening, to say the least.

However, despite the comfortable way they were together now, Chi-Chi couldn’t help but think back to Ms. Matcha’s teachings and how she wasn’t following some of them when it came to being a good wife. Chi-Chi hadn’t talked with either her tutor or her father since her wedding day, but soon one or both of them would figure she’d had enough time alone with Goku and would start to check up on her. They wouldn’t ask, at least not directly, but Chi-Chi knew her father was eagerly awaiting grandchildren and Ms. Matcha always seemed to know whenever she was slacking at something. One way or another, it’d come out that they hadn’t consummated their marriage yet and then she’d have to endure disappointed looks and pointed comments.

In all honesty though that wasn’t the only reason why Chi-Chi wanted to consummate their marriage. Goku, despite being shy with regards to being touched intimately, had little care when it came to being seen naked or nearly naked. He had a habit of leaving the shower without even wearing a towel and getting dressed in their room. The first time he’d done that she’d nearly fainted. Goku, thankfully hadn’t noticed her reaction though. Chi-Chi had even, once or twice, seen him when he was both naked and aroused. It’d been a complete accident and while Goku, as usual, hadn’t minded the fact that he was nude in front of her, he had been annoyed at his body’s reaction.

Those incidents had been quickly brushed aside, at least by Goku. Chi-Chi wished she could so easily do the same, but seeing Goku bare like that, and often dripping with leftover water always made her feel hot and she couldn’t help but think of him like that a lot when Goku was gone training. There were times when she’d just zone out, thinking about walking up to him after his shower, running her hands over his chest, licking a droplet of water off of his neck.

Her fantasies never seemed to last for very long, but Chi-Chi was starting to understand what her books meant when they described the ache of wanting someone or when they talked about feeling empty inside. Sometimes she couldn’t help but squirm whenever she thought of Goku, trying to make the heat and want go away by whatever means she could. 

They hadn’t done anything close to their actions on their wedding night and they’ve certainly never went beyond that either, but Chi-Chi very much would like to. Though they have exchanged small chaste kisses every now and then, it didn’t feel like enough to her. It didn’t help that she was the only one instigating those kisses, and they weren’t even on his lips most of the time.

Still, despite her frustrations, they were getting closer. At least, she liked to think that they were getting closer to each other. Even if they weren’t as close as she’d like them to be. Chi-Chi had an idea to help bring them together even more.

Tonight was a full moon. More than that, it was supposed to be a cloudless night. A perfect time for stargazing and, Chi-Chi thought, a perfect date-like opportunity to bring their relationship up to the next level.

She smiled to herself as she made some snacks. It wasn’t even noon yet, however given Goku’s appetite it was best to be prepared with a lot of food at any given time. They weren’t anything fancy, just some cookies and crackers. If she had time after dinner she might even be able to prepare some fruit and vegetable finger foods too. If Goku didn’t come home for lunch she may even be able to make some dango, though he’d probably sniff it out before dinner and demolish it as a pre meal snack. She didn’t think she’d be able to hide dango as well as she could hide the other goodies she’d baked.

Even if she decided not to make dango, Chi-Chi hoped he wouldn’t be home for lunch. She wanted to keep her plans a surprise and she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to keep it from him if he asked.

Briefly, she thought about the little bottle of perfume still sitting hidden in her dresser before dismissing the idea of using it. Yes she did want to have sex with Goku, but not now. Despite the niggling feeling that she’d disappoint her tutor if she didn’t get intimate with her husband soon, Chi-Chi didn’t think he’d feel any more comfortable having sex with her now than he had a couple days ago on their first night in their house.

While she wouldn’t say it was unfortunate, Goku did show up for lunch which meant she likely wouldn’t be able to make dango, however she would never say no to spending time with him. Luckily though he didn’t ask why she was in such a good mood or her plans for that night. Maybe he had an inkling that she wanted to surprise him with something?

Probably not. Even at her most optimistic, Chi-Chi didn’t think they knew each other _that_ well. At least, not yet.

Despite wanting to make more snacks without them vanishing instantly, she couldn’t help but be a little saddened that Goku left for more training not long after he finished eating his lunch. Chi-Chi knew they hadn’t had their routine going for a while, but Goku never seemed interested in taking a day off to spend time together. Granted, it worked out well for her today, but sometimes she wouldn’t mind just spending the day with him. Especially if all they did was wander around the mountain.

Chi-Chi had been waiting for him to offer a tour of his mountain home to her, since all she really knew about the area was the immediate land around their house. At this rate though, she’d have to start exploring the area by herself.

As it was, if she wanted a good place for their little star viewing date she’d have to ask him about good spots or they’d have to climb onto the roof. Not that it would matter much, Chi-Chi just thought it’d be nice to be able to plan out the place of their date.

Of course, their little after dinner date couldn’t happen until after they’d had dinner, so it wasn’t long before she decided she’d made enough snacks and set them aside to begin preparing for dinner.

She smiled to herself as she started washing the rice. Tonight was going to be perfect. They’d have a nice meal before going out and watching the moon rise. Then they’d eat the snacks, maybe even feed each other, and lay down to look at the stars. If Goku didn’t know about the stories behind the constellations, Chi-Chi would be able to tell him them. They’d probably even get some kisses in before heading back inside.

As expected, Goku came home hungry for dinner. He also brought back a large fish that they could break down and freeze for a later meal. For the sake of being more efficient, and because of her after dinner plans, Chi-Chi had him do that while she finished cooking the bulk of their food.

“I’m back!” She half turned away from the stove to see him hefting a few parcels of fish meat. “Where do you want me to put these?”

“Did you write the date on them? And the freezer’s fine.”

“Why do we need to put the date on them?”

“So we know when we put them in the freezer. That way, if too much time has passed, we’ll know that it’s no good to eat.”

“That can happen?”

Chi-Chi wasn’t sure if he was questioning the thought of food going bad from being frozen or the idea that it’d last long enough to go bad in the first place, considering how much he usually ate and how little leftovers they had. “Yeah. Though I don’t think we’ll have to worry for a while, it’s still a good thing to do.”

“Mn, if you say so.” He looked at the parcels dubiously. Chi-Chi was just about to turn back to her work when Goku spoke up again. “What’s todays date anyway? And I don’t think pencil will stick to the wrapping.”

“I can take care of that. Could you watch the pan and make sure the food doesn’t burn?”

They easily switched roles, though it was only for the few minutes it took her to hunt down a marker and store the fish away in the freezer.

Goku smiled at her as she returned to the stove. “So, you seem to be in a good mood today, did something good happen?”

She giggled in response, so he _had_ noticed! “Not yet, but tonight is supposed to be clear, so I thought we could go out and watch the stars.”

“What’ll they be doing tonight?”

“Hm? What’d you mean?”

“I mean,” he scratched his head in confusion, “why do we need to watch them?”

What kind of question was that? “It’s something nice and peaceful to do, to spend time together under the stars. Besides, I made some food for us to eat as a picnic while we’re out.” He perked up a bit at the mention of food and she had to hold back a smile.

Chi-Chi hadn’t thought it’d be hard to convince Goku to go out and spend time with her, considering how accepting he’d been of nearly every other activity she’d decided they’d do, but food was a great motivator for the times he hesitated.

As a final touch she added, “and it’s a full moon tonight too, so we don’t have to- Hm? What’s wrong?” As soon as she’d mentioned the moon his face fell.

“If it’s a full moon, then we shouldn’t go out tonight.”

“What? Why not?”

“There’s a monster on the mountain that comes out whenever someone looks at the full moon.”

Chi-Chi blinked at that, she’d never heard of a creature that only came out when looking at the moon, and while there were dinosaurs and other large creatures in the area, Goku had hardly batted an eye at them. Why was he hesitating now?

“What does it look like?”

“Don’t know, I’ve never seen it before, but Grandpa told me it was impossible to defeat. So we’d have to go to bed before dark whenever there was a full moon.”

That actually made sense, Chi-Chi could picture Goku as an energetic child and it was easy to figure that, for an elderly guardian, he might be a bit too much to handle, at least some of the time. Gohan probably made that story up so that, at least once a month, they could go to bed early.

“Your grandpa probably made it up so you’d go to sleep early. Any-”

“He didn’t though! It’s real and running into it is _bad_!”

Chi-Chi had to take a calming breath to keep from snapping at him for interrupting her. “ _If_ it’s real, you’re the strongest fighter on the planet. You don’t bat an eye when it comes to fighting dinosaurs. Surely it’d be easy to fight some sort of moon monster.” Easier than Piccolo at least.

“It’s not that simple! Not even grandpa could defeat it!”

At any other time, she would have found his childish hero worship of his grandfather charming and cute. Right now though, it only added to her temper.

“Oh _grow up_! Gohan was strong but he was also old! Even if it was too hard for him to fight, you’re more than strong enough for any sort of monster that might attack us!”

“Chi-Chi, I’m _serious_.”

“So am I!” Chi-Chi had been looking forward to this night all day and Goku was ruining it because of some childhood story.

“We are _not_ going out tonight!”

By now they were practically yelling in each other’s faces. In the back of her mind Chi-Chi was well aware that her temper had gotten away from her, however she was well past the point of caring. Luckily before she could say anything she’d sincerely regret, the smell of burning vegetables got both their attention. Chi-Chi quickly turned to deal with the food before it was burned too badly.

“We’ll talk about this later.”

“There’s _nothing_ to talk about.”

“Wha?” She turned quickly to see her husband storming out of the kitchen. “Where do you think _you’re_ going?”

“Out!”

He was gone before she could say another word. Thankfully he didn’t slam the door shut, but that was the only good thing she could find in this situation.

Still angry she turned back to her cooking. Goku would be back, before dark if avoiding the moon was _so_ important, and when he returned he’d have his usual large amount of food waiting for him. Regardless of how she felt about him at the moment, as his wife it was her job to make sure he was well fed.

It just might be a little crisper than what he normally had.

Goku hadn’t returned by the time dinner was finished cooking. Not that she’d expected him to; it hadn’t been far off from being done in the first place. He hadn’t returned by the time she’d finished eating her meal and put the food away either. That was slightly more concerning.

It didn’t help that actually sitting down and eating allowed her time to calm down and reflect on their argument. In retrospect, Chi-Chi shouldn’t have been so committed to her plan of a late night date, at least without asking Goku about it first. Goku had also been really bothered by the whole ‘full moon monster.’ Even if it was just a childhood story, if it was so important that it stuck with him to this day, then she probably shouldn’t have snapped at him for it.

She finished putting the food away and started working on the dishes. It was their first fight, a milestone for their marriage, and something she’d expected to happen eventually. She just hadn’t expected it to be over something like a date, or for it to get so intense so quickly. Knowing that it was inevitable didn’t help much in easing her mind with regards for their marriage though. What if she ruined their marriage with this fight? She probably erased all the progress they’d made in their relationship since their wedding night regardless.

Time flew by and before she knew it, the dishes were done and Chi-Chi was alone on the couch trying, and failing, to read a book. Since summer was still nearing its peak, the sun set at a late hour, therefore even though it was getting quite late the sky remained bright.

Goku still hadn’t returned.

The house was far too quiet without him there. It was surprising how quickly she’d gotten used to having him around in the evening. With a sigh Chi-Chi marked her place in her book and retired to bed. Goku was clearly going to stay out until the sun would finally start to set, so she left the main lights on for when he got back.

Seeing as Goku had been bothered by the idea of so much as looking at the full moon, Chi-Chi pulled the curtains in their room closed. After that she didn’t take very long to get ready for sleep. Though she did pause at her dresser.

Sitting on top was a tall bottle. Like the perfume in her drawer the bottle, and the stuff inside, had been a gift from Ms. Matcha. Though this one had been from when she was quite young. Just after her tutor had started teaching her, actually.

Chi-Chi had started getting terrible nightmares about monsters coming and eating her. They were typical childhood fears really, though it had bothered her significantly at the time. Her father tried to help, but back then it had taken more than him leaving the light on or checking under the bed for her to feel safe.

Her tutor had noticed her fatigue and asked her about it. A few days later she gave Chi-Chi the bottle filled with some kind of incense oil. It smelled sweet and herby, the most distinct smell she could pick out was lavender, but the most important thing was that her tutor swore that it would help her sleep and keep anything non-human away. It’d worked and her terrible dreams stopped the night she’d been given the bottle.

To this day Chi-Chi still didn’t understand why Ms. Matcha was so specific with her wording, but she figured it didn’t matter too much. It was probably just something her tutor said to make her feel safer anyway. While she didn’t experiment much with it, she had noticed that the incense didn’t work on bugs or spiders at least. Luckily she didn’t mind sharing her sleeping space with the small creatures.

The smell reminded her that she was safe and smelling it always helped her sleep. Though she’d never admit it out loud, she always thought of it as her safety bottle. Carefully she removed the stopper and let the scent waft over her. Immediately the tension in her shoulders disappeared and her eyelids began to droop. Her worries drifted away and she slipped into the bed and was quickly asleep.

Chi-Chi woke up alarmed. There wasn’t anything she could see or hear that would wake her, much less anything that would’ve made her feel alarmed. She rolled over to see if Goku was similarly affected, but to her surprise he wasn’t there. His side of the bed was cold too, so he hadn’t been there for a while if he had even slept there at all.

A quick glance at the clock showed that it was late. Far too late for Goku to still be up and far too early for him to have possibly gotten up to train. Had he not wanted to sleep in their bed with her?

Her mind flashed back to earlier that night when they’d argued. Had it really bothered him so much that he’d rather be away from her?

Slowly she sat up and rubbed the sleep more thoroughly out of her eyes. Chi-Chi still felt uneasy and not just because Goku wasn’t there. Though she wasn’t sure why else she would feel so uncertain.

Just as she was contemplating getting up and looking for her husband a deep booming rumble startled her. It sounded like nearby thunder and it shook her like an earthquake, but the windows didn’t rattle like they would in the case of either a storm or earthquake and nothing in the house even shifted a little bit.

It was over far too quickly for her to really react past the shock of hearing such a sudden loud noise. Chi-Chi uncurled herself from the ball she’d instinctively scrunched up into and slowly got up.

Perhaps it was just the contrast of that loud noise from before, but the night seemed unnaturally silent. She couldn’t hear the nighttime insects or the house settling, there was no breeze rustling the trees either, much less a storm close enough to create that loud of a thunder clap.

Her footsteps were as silent as possible as she crept through the house. Nothing at all seemed amiss, though she nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard Goku snoring on the couch. He really hadn’t wanted to sleep with her. Still if he was sleeping so soundly then maybe that noise she’d heard had just been a nightmare. Even if Chi-Chi had been sure she was completely awake.

With a silent sigh and a small shake of her head, Chi-Chi returned to her room leaving Goku sleeping on the couch. Even if she still felt uneasy, Chi-Chi didn’t want to wake him up over an odd dream. And if he wanted to sleep on the couch, there wasn’t anything she could do to change that. She’ll apologize about their fight in the morning regardless since their argument had clearly bothered him more than she’d thought.

She didn’t sleep well for the rest of the night, despite the off and on scent of lavender that would permeate her senses. When dawn came and Chi-Chi got up, it was with great reluctance and much internal grumbling. Goku was, as usual, up before her and had gone out to train before breakfast. Groggily she shuffled her way into the kitchen and stared blankly at the counter. She wanted to surprise him by making his favorite foods but he’d never said what he liked to eat other than a lot. 

With a tired sigh she got to work cooking up something quick, easy and filling. Chi-Chi easily lost herself in the fairly repetitive task that came with cooking a lot of the same type of food, so much so that she nearly missed it when Goku came in to eat. She however absolutely didn’t miss the way he skirted around the table and settled himself as far from her as possible rather than hover over her and snatch some not yet done bits of food.

A part of her hoped he was doing that because he was worried she was still mad at him, the rest of her was just hurt that he didn’t want to be near her.

Chi-Chi really needed to apologize for last night. Nothing would improve until she apologized, she knew that. Instead she asked if he noticed anything last night as she placed the food down on the table.

He gave her a narrow look. “You didn’t look at the moon, did you?”

She gave a small sigh, “no, it seemed important to you, so I closed the curtains. I just thought I heard something last night, but it was probably a dream.”

Goku seemed to relax a little bit, “really?”

“Yes and,” apologizing had always been hard for her, perhaps because of how her father would spoil her. Still this was Goku, if it was for Goku than she should be able to do it. “I’m sorry, for last night. I should have asked you before setting my hopes on going out. And for fighting you about your moon monster.”

That earned her a small smile. “Thanks Chi-Chi. I’m sorry too, you took me by surprise.” His gaze turned a little sad as he looked back to his, surprisingly, still untouched breakfast. “With the moon being gone for so long, I’d honestly nearly forgotten about it. But being back here, it’s just…”

Chi-Chi bit her lip. Something about the argument before bothered her, but she honestly wasn’t sure she should ask. She did so regardless because it felt like it was something important. “Last night, why were you so sure this monster was real?”

He shrugged, almost nonchalantly though a slight tension in his shoulders betrayed him. “It killed my grandpa, and whenever it came around a lot of the area usually got destroyed.”

She sucked in a sharp breath, “oh, Goku, I’m so sorry.” She felt like the worst person in the world. It killed his grandfather and she’d just treated it like a bedtime story. No wonder he’d gotten so angry.

“Nah, it’s fine.”

“It’s not. I hurt you, and that’s not okay.” Fighting each other might have been inevitable, but even when she was angry she hadn’t wanted to hurt him in any way.

“You didn’t mean it though.”

“That doesn’t mean that the things I said didn’t hurt, or that I shouldn’t apologize for saying them.”

A strange noise came from Goku, but his smile was a bit more genuine and he was a lot less tense. “Thanks, Chi-Chi,” he repeated.

Her only response was to smile back as she too settled down for breakfast. She was in her usual seat, closest to the kitchen so that she could easily grab anything she’d forgotten. Goku was still sitting as far away from her has he could while still sitting at the table, but she didn’t want to push him when they’d only just started repairing their relationship from last night’s fight.

She’d just started eating when Goku spoke up again. “Say, Chi-Chi…”

“Hm?”

“I was wondering, if you wanted to, next month we could go somewhere else and look at the moon. I saw it plenty of times with Krillin when I was training with master Roshi and nothing bad happened then. So I think it’s just in this area.”

A blush crept its way up her cheeks. A full moon couldn’t have such good memories for him, and here he was offering to endure it just because she’d wanted to see it with him. “It’s fine. I’d wanted to see the stars more than the moon anyway.”

“I still don’t get what’s so special about them.”

“I wanted to see what constellations I could find, star pictures,” she elaborated at his slightly confused look. “They’re a bit abstract, but they have stories attached to them and you liked it whenever I read other stories out loud to you so I thought you’d like that too.” Chi-Chi admittedly ended her explanation mumbling as saying it out loud was more embarrassing than she thought it’d be.

“Oh,” he hummed a bit though it ended in more of a purring noise. “That does sound kind of nice. Though I think it’d be better when there’s no moon.”

“Okay, maybe in a couple weeks?”

They lapsed into a comfortable silence after his enthusiastic nod. Before Chi-Chi knew it, breakfast was over and Goku was out the door to train. Now that Chi-Chi was much more awake and in a better mood, she went back to the bedroom to get herself ready for the rest of the day.

The scent of lavender and green herbs hit her as soon as she opened the door, causing her to sneeze even as it made her eyes heavy. She’d forgotten how almost overwhelming the oil in her safety bottle could be. Opening the window to let the room air out, she quickly went and replaced the stopper, cutting off the source of the soothing smell. That done, it was easy enough to get started on her daily routine of cleaning the house.

Which led her to her current task of cleaning the floors for the day. The floors themselves didn’t really need to be cleaned, but Chi-Chi had gotten used to a certain level of activity when at home and her house with Goku, though perfect for the two of them, didn’t hold a candle to the size of the Ox King’s castle. Just cleaning those floors was enough of a work out for the day. Whereas with her new home she’d have to clean the house top to bottom to reach the same effect. At least it was still a decent workout routine.

Technically she cleaned the house bottom to top though. Ms. Matcha and every housewife or maid she talked to tisked whenever they saw her doing it. Chi-Chi was supposed to clean from the top down, so that any dust or grime would fall and be cleaned up on the next pass. Chi-Chi, however saw that as a challenge and as a way to be more thorough in what she did.

Still, cleaning the same thing every day was kind of boring. A part of her wished she could join her husband in training in the woods, however everything she’d heard and read about being married seemed to agree that housewives did not go out into the forest and punch boulders. She doubted Goku would mind, but her father and Ms. Matcha would likely give her quietly disapproving looks should they find out. Well, mostly Ms. Matcha, her father would be outwardly disapproving while exuding fatherly pride. And, well, training with household chores seemed to be effective enough; she’d made it to the semi-finals of the most recent World Martial Arts Tournament after all.

So she slowly cleaned up the ground floor, working on her stances while sweeping and occasionally using the broom’s handle as a staff to spice things up. Though it was early it was also quite warm out, so she’d left the windows and door open for some fresh air. It would mean she’d have to dust a bit more tomorrow, but given her cleaning routine, it didn’t make much difference to her. She let her mind wonder as her body fell into that familiar routine, drifting to how quiet the house was whenever Goku was out training, which he did every day.

He was, she found, whole heartedly dedicated to martial arts. Which was not a surprise at all, but the way he single mindedly focused on it was a bit of one. There were only two things that could distract him from training; an actual fight or food. Thankfully he also regarded resting as a part of training so she didn’t have to worry about him overworking and hurting himself. She just wished he’d consider taking day long breaks rather than hour long ones.

Though she herself couldn’t say she was as enthusiastic about the art, Chi-Chi couldn’t honestly say she minded it. Her father was like that too sometimes. More than that, there was something admirable in seeing someone so dedicated to something they loved.

Still, she’d much prefer that any future children they had would find a safer passion. Even if Piccolo wasn’t still out there, martial artists seemed to attract danger. Also, other than the World Martial Arts Tournament, there wasn’t a lot of opportunities to gain money as a martial artist. Nearly all other tournaments were much harder to enter with less prize money and they weren’t as much of a free for all when it came to the actual combat either.

She sighed to herself just thinking about their future offspring. Honestly, considering how their relationship seemed to be progressing at a snail’s pace with regards to intimacy, children will probably be a distant thought for a while. In the back of her mind, she acknowledged that that would probably be a good thing. That it would give her and Goku as much time as needed to get used to each other and to better avoid fights like the one that’d happened yesterday.

The rest of her was lamenting the idea of waiting. She was as old as her mother was when she was born, and while she knew it was irrational, Chi-Chi couldn’t help but think that waiting would somehow dishonor her mother’s memory.

Movement brought her out of her thoughts. A spider was setting up its web in a nearby open window, yet strangely it stayed just outside enough to not be in the house. It wasn’t a small spider, but certainly not the largest she’d ever seen. Chi-Chi gave it a small smile. Bugs had never bothered her, and spiders even less. Still where it was spinning its home was not a good place. So she went and got a piece of paper.

“Hello little one.” Her words were soft as she leaned near the arachnid and slid the paper towards it. “That’s not a good place for a home, you’ll get squished later. Come on, let’s find you a better spot.”

The spider was surprisingly docile. Allowing her to nudge it onto the paper and bring it fully inside. There was a small nook, not far from the door, that Chi-Chi always forgot to dust, where it would be a perfect little spider home. Due to her daily cleaning, there hadn’t been much of a bug problem, but a little extra help couldn’t possibly hurt. She didn’t think Goku would notice their new roommate, and even if he did she doubted he’d care. She might tell him about it during dinner regardless, if only because this was the most interesting thing to happen to her since breakfast.

The spider’s presence also gave her something to talk to while going about her routine, though it couldn’t possibly be with her all day or in every room. The idea of the spider listening in on her was more appealing than the thought of simply talking to herself though technically there wasn’t much difference between the two.

So she chatted. Mostly about the fight she and Goku had had last night and how she wasn’t even sure if he’d slipped in their room long enough to get another set of clothes. The thought was kind of gross, but it also made her feel guilty. How badly had she made him feel that he hadn’t even wanted to be in the same room as her? Even if they had apologized and made up with each other, the idea that he’d done something like that in the first place didn’t sit well with her at all.

Regardless of how last night or the morning went, she’d had a fairly normal routine, until near around noon when she’d started to feel uneasy. It had nothing to do with last night’s fight, for all that it was still near the front of her mind. Rather, she’d started to get the sense of being watched.

There wasn’t any reason for her to think she was being watched, unless Goku came back early and decided she was the best thing to look at. However she had the hope that if it was Goku it wouldn’t feel nearly as creepy to her as she felt now. It felt like there were small bugs crawling all over her skin, even though she’d looked often and knew that there was nothing on her.

Looking out the window, even hiding and peeking out, yielded no results either. There was no strange movement in the nearby trees, nor was there any indication that anyone had been nearby at any point in time.

That feeling left her distracted, enough so that she cut herself a few times when making lunch. She quickly gave up and just ate some of the leftovers from her planned date after patching up her minor wounds, of course. She had to smile at the state of the fridge. Clearly Goku hadn’t gone hungry last night, as most of what she’d made yesterday was gone.

A part of her wanted to take the day off from her cleaning, go back to her bedroom and open up her safety bottle again until that uneasy feeling left her. However, Chi-Chi had done that just yesterday when she spent the bulk of it making snacks. It didn’t feel right to do that again so soon.

So with a grim sigh, Chi-Chi went about completing her chores.

The feeling didn’t go away when Goku came home in the evening, though she was relieved at his presence. This time she didn’t wait around to see if he’d pick up on her mood. So rather than her normal, cheery ‘welcome home,’ she said something quite a bit different.

“Goku, you can sense ki, right?”

He blinked in surprise at the sudden question. “Yeah? Why?”

“It’s just…” She bit her lip, suddenly feeling nervous. What if he thought she was being silly? Or weak? “I was just wondering if anyone was around.”

“Hm, not that I can sense.” He peered at her. “What’s wrong?”

“I just had the feeling I was being watched earlier.” She still had that feeling, but she didn’t want to alarm Goku. “It’s probably nothing. I didn’t sleep well after that weird dream I told you about, so I’m probably just tired.”

“Hm…”

Now that she’d told Goku about it and convinced herself it was nothing, Chi-Chi found it a bit easier to ignore her unease and was better able to focus on making dinner for the two of them.

“Do you want to learn?”

“Hm? Learn what?” She half turned to face him. He was standing closer to her than he’d been this morning, though still not quite as close as he usually was.

“To sense ki, of course. I can teach you if you want.”

His offer made her blush. How sweet of him to offer to teach her something that would make her feel safer. “Are you sure? Papa tried to teach me some stuff with ki, but it didn’t work out too well.” Though that might have been because he himself wasn’t all that proficient with ki.

Goku just gave a wide grin that made her heart flutter and her cheeks heat up again. “It’ll be fine, sensing ki is easy. You’ll get it in no time.”

The next day showed that it was not fine, or easy. Chi-Chi didn’t get it at all. While it did mean he spent the entire morning with her, it also meant that both of them spent the morning frustrated. And to make it worse that creepy feeling of being watched was _still_ there!

Sensing ki was something Gohan had taught Goku when he was really young; it wasn’t something he thought about anymore. At least when it came to doing it.

Chi-Chi, on the other hand hadn’t been taught anything involving ki, certainly not from a young age. The few attempts that had been made happened after she’d met Goku and usually devolved into a shouting match between her and her father. She’d rather avoid shouting at Goku so soon after their first fight, but if he didn’t stop insisting that all she needed to do was to find the ‘deep, tight feeling in her core’ she was going to get loud.

Thankfully he called for a lunchbreak before it got to that point, but it was a near thing. After she’d calmed down while cooking, they both agreed it would be for the best if they stopped trying to get her to use ki for the day. It did, unfortunately, mean that she didn’t get to spend more time with Goku, but she honestly couldn’t complain at the moment.

Still, that left Chi-Chi with only her little spider friend to talk to. Not that it was hard for her to find something to talk about. She spend half the time grumbling about the teaching methods of both Goku and her father. Goku, she would say, was marginally better than her dad; if only because it was more detailed than ‘just focus and do it.’

Still, while she knew a little bit more about ki manipulation than she had before, Chi-Chi still couldn’t manage to do it. Whatever feeling Goku wanted her to feel simply wasn’t there and seeing as ki was something Goku knew all of his life, he didn’t know how to coach her into drawing it out.

Despite the now ever present feeling of being watched eating at her nerves, the rest of the day went well. That night, Goku tentatively asked her if she still felt like she was being watched. While he was sweet about it, there wasn’t any proof at all that there was someone out there, so with a frustrated sigh, she told him that while, yes she still felt uneasy, it really was just in her head.

Despite her assurances, Goku still looked concerned and unconvinced. Despite herself and regardless of the circumstances, Chi-Chi inwardly cheered at how their relationship was improving. That night she slept very well, content in the knowledge that things were getting better between her and Goku and surrounded by the scent of lavender and herbs.

The next day, it was like waking up the morning after their fight. Oh, she wasn’t groggy and there were no apologies exchanged, but Goku was avoiding being near her like he had before.

She’d tried asking him what was wrong, but he couldn’t seem to give her an answer. He didn’t offer to try and help her with ki again that day either. Not that she could blame him, but it kind of hurt that he’d given up on her so quickly.

That wasn’t the only strange thing happening with Goku today though. For whatever reason he decided to train right outside the house. While Chi-Chi wasn’t complaining, it was strange considering that he usually went elsewhere. It did mean she could bring out his lunch, which he ate eagerly, but he still quickly put distance between the two of them.

Luckily he wasn’t so eager to leave her presence when he came in for dinner, even if a darker part of her mind thought that was because it meant he’d have a big meal. Surprisingly he asked if that feeling of being watched had returned.

It’d never left but Goku was being such a sweet heart about it she didn’t have the heart to tell him that his presence wasn’t enough to drive it away. She also didn’t want to actually lie to him, so she just smiled and thanked him for checking up on her but assured him she was fine.

“Besides,” she continued, “even if there was someone spying on me, you know I can hold my own in a fight. It was just kind of worrying that I couldn’t see who was watching me.”

He hummed in acknowledgement of her words and let it drop.

Despite the rocky start to the day, Chi-Chi once again quickly and soundly fell asleep, lulled by the comforting smell of lavender.

The next day, however started even worse. Goku had barely wanted to sit at the table with her, gobbling up the food as soon as she set it down and dashing out the door when she finished cooking and went to join him. He still stayed around the house though. At least, she could hear him training nearby, she never seemed to be in the same area he was in however. Which was unfortunate, Chi-Chi had quickly learned that she enjoyed watching him work out.

She couldn’t keep trying to peek on him, however since she had her own chores to do. More than that after lunch her father called to check up on things, now that their ‘honeymoon’ was over, interrupting her daily dusting, such as it was. She was tempted to call Goku over so that he could talk with his father- in- law as well, but seeing as he hadn’t really wanted to be around her at the moment, she thought it best not to push him.

Besides, she’d never gone so long without talking to her father before. It’d been surprising how much she’d missed his voice.

However after the initial pleasantries were out of the way and after they’d caught up a bit on what was going on in their lives, as well as the saddening news that Ms. Matcha had moved out of Pleasant Village, the conversation subject turned a bit trickier. At least for Chi-Chi.

“So what has Goku been up to lately?”

“Oh, mostly training and hunting. He likes to keep busy during the day.”

Her father’s laugh filled her ears, “keeping himself busy till the night comes? I remember that feeling. Speaking of which, do you have any exciting news to share with your dear old dad?”

Chi-Chi forced out a laugh. “Papa! You know that sort of thing doesn’t happen _that_ quickly! Even if it did, I probably wouldn’t know for a while yet.”

“Oh, you never know. Sometimes it only takes once.”

“So I’ve been told.”

“Anyway, you’ll let me know as soon as possible when you do get pregnant right? I want to spoil my grandchildren!”

“I promise you’ll be the first to know.” Right after herself and Goku of course.

“Good! I need a good strong little ox to take over when I get old!” He laughed out.

It was a joke, Chi-Chi forced herself to laugh along as she _knew_ it was a joke, but she still couldn’t help but feel a little guilty. While Chi-Chi always knew she wanted to be a housewife, her father had always wanted to pass down his position to her. First as a bandit leader and then as the mayor of their hometown. While they never actually fought about it, she could never quite shake the feeling that he was a little disappointed she didn’t want to follow in his footsteps.

At least until he figured that if she wouldn’t take over after him then perhaps her child would. Then the hints started dropping that she should marry a good strong man and have strong children together, especially sons.

Even before she’d gotten married, those hints were a little grating; while it was great that he now wholeheartedly supported her choice to just be a wife, she didn’t like the idea of him passing that expectation along to her child any better than when he’d put it on her.

So she quickly changed the subject to asking if he knew how to cook tiger meat. Every time she tried it always ended up tough, chewy and flavorless. While he’d never cooked tiger before, her father eagerly jumped on the subject of cooking. Not for the first time, she had to wonder why her father hadn’t wanted to be a chef.

Still, it didn’t take long before he was hinting at the best foods to turn into baby food and how to do it. Chi-Chi had to bite back a sigh at that, honestly it seemed like he wanted her to have children more than she did.

Eventually the subject turned to their finances and what Goku was going to do to make money. They didn’t actually need any right now, considering most of their food came from the surrounding land and everything they couldn’t get or make themselves was still in good shape. Chi-Chi honestly didn’t know what he would want to do for a job considering his interests primarily involved training and eating.

Her father had a few suggestions, such as construction or farming, based on how master Roshi had trained him and Gohan all those years ago. Goku had also mentioned something like that, in the quiet nights before their big fight, he’d talked about some of his adventures and one or two interesting things that happened when he was training with the turtle hermit. It sounded like a good idea, so she resolved to bring it up with her husband.

By the time she and her father said their goodbyes to each other, over an hour had passed. She hadn’t realized how much time they’d spent talking, or how much she’d missed just chatting with him. Still, she was kind of glad he hadn’t asked to visit yet. Dealing with his hints about giving him grandchildren over the phone was one thing, Chi-Chi wasn’t ready to deal with it in person again though. She also wasn’t sure how Goku would react to those little hints and slight innuendos, considering how little interest he had with regards to sex in general.

As she replaced the phone into its cradle, she noticed the spider sitting patiently on a shelf. Chi-Chi gave a small sigh as she spoke softly to it. “At least you don’t have to worry about giving your parents grandchildren. Or about disappointing them if you don’t. Papa wanted so much for me, sometimes it feels like I’ve let him down by wanting to just be a housewife.”

She turned back to where she’d put her dusting rag when her dad had called. “But I guess that just means I have to be the best housewife possible.” That was also the main reason he’d even hired Ms. Matcha to tutor her. So that she’d get the education needed to be the best possible housewife for her future husband and be the best mother she could possibly be for her future children.

Thinking of Ms. Matcha, it was sad she’d moved away. Her tutor had apparently been an old friend of her mother’s, though the stern teacher rarely talked about her. She had also gotten along fairly well with her father and Chi-Chi had been kind of hoping there’d be something more there eventually.

Regardless, she hoped Ms. Matcha would call her or write her a letter, as Chi-Chi didn’t have any way to contact her. Maybe now that she wasn’t her student the older woman would be more willing to talk about her mother. Chi-Chi honestly didn’t know much about her; it pained her father to tell her much more than a few anecdotal stories and comments. Well, Chi-Chi also knew how her mom had died. One of her dad’s ex-friends had gotten drunk and told her about it, then her dad had found out and ensured that friend wouldn’t be seen again, but Chi-Chi didn’t like to think about that part.

She shook off that memory and refocused on cleaning. There was quite a bit left to do before she had to go and make dinner. Chi-Chi wanted to make a nice and big meal that Goku would love for several reasons. For one, maybe it would help bridge the gap that was reforming between them. For another she had promised her father to bring up the subject of jobs to Goku and she didn’t know how he’d react to that.

Before a couple days ago, she wouldn’t have been worried at all. But now she’d realized that he wouldn’t just go along with whatever she wanted if he didn’t like it. She hoped he would go along with her on this one. If only because she wasn’t sure how she’d explain to her father that her husband didn’t want to do his husbandly duties and provide for her and their hypothetical future children.

Never mind that she’d never even asked Goku if he’d wanted children yet, but that would be a talk for later, when he wasn’t avoiding her during the day. She didn’t really want to talk with him about getting a job right now either, but she said she would so she’d have to.

Dinner that night had gone about as she’d expected it to. Goku sat down as far away from her as possible and proceeded to eat everything placed in front of him. He was significantly neater about it than he had been during their first dinner together though.

She could still recall the abashed and sheepish look on his face when she scolded him for his sloppy eating habits. Because there had been no need for him to eat so fast, she wasn’t going to take the food away until he was done, and how messy and rude he’d been while doing so. She’d been so happy when he’d taken her words to heart and began eating slower, for him, and more neatly.

Chi-Chi easily shook those thoughts away though, now was not the time to think about things like that. Thinking about that sort of thing is why she’d automatically assumed he’d be fine with anything she suggested, and that hadn’t led to anything good.

When she did work up the nerve to mention his potential future employment, he’d looked adorably confused.

“Do I _have_ to get a job? Whenever I hear about them they sound kind of boring.”

“Well, some jobs can be. But it is something you have to do. There are some things we just can’t get by hunting and fishing.”

“I guess. But why can’t you get one?”

“Because I’m the wife and you’re the husband.” When she said it like that it sounded so childish, but that was what she’d been taught and she doubted Ms. Matcha would be wrong about that sort of thing.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“As your wife it’s my duty to stay at home, look after the house, cook your food and be there for you when you get back. Whereas your duty, as my husband, is to protect me from harm that I can’t face myself and provide for me. To make money for new clothes, extra food, emergencies; things like that.”

“Oh,” he rubbed at the back of his neck. “I don’t mind the thought of protecting you but it still sounds like this job thing is something you’d be better at than me.”

“That’s not how it works.” She just barely managed to refrain from snapping at him, which wasn’t really a good thing. Chi-Chi didn’t want to lose her temper right now, not when they were still recovering from their last fight. Taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly, she continued. “You don’t have to get one now, but I would like it if you thought about it. Papa suggested farm work or construction. Didn’t you do those things as well when training under master Roshi?” she added, hoping it would help her case.

“Hm, that’s true. It was really boring though it did help me get used to wearing weights.” He crossed his arms and frowned. “But we didn’t do that sort of thing all day. We did a bunch of other stuff too.”

“Well, like I said, I’d like you to think about it.”

He made a noise of acknowledgement and Chi-Chi let the subject drop. It was probably the best she was going to get for now.

After dinner Goku decided to go and do a little bit more training. He didn’t make that big a deal of it, but Chi-Chi was fairly sure that training near the house wasn’t quite enough for him. She still wasn’t sure why he was training so close to the house, but maybe tomorrow she should suggest he train somewhere else? She didn’t really want to, knowing he was nearby did help her ignore the crawly feeling of being watched even if it never seemed to go away.

The next day it became obvious that Goku had had similar thoughts, as he didn’t stay near the house. Actually he wasn’t in the house at all. It wasn’t unusual for him to be out training by the time she woke up, but he always returned for breakfast, except for today, apparently.

Chi-Chi packed away the breakfast food and spent the rest of the day feeling melancholy. It kind of reminded her of how her dad would get around the New Year. Around the time when her mother had died.

“I’m being ridiculous.” She sighed to herself, “Goku isn’t gone forever, he’s probably just lost track of time. He’ll be home for dinner.” With that she tried to shake herself out of her funk and she started her chores for the day.

Unfortunately it didn’t work for long and she soon found herself staring out the window and sighing, hoping for a glimpse of bright orange. Maybe it was because he’d spent the last two days nearby or maybe it was because she hadn’t even seen him during breakfast. But he’d probably only been gone a few hours and she missed him. Would it be like this when he got a job?

“I wonder if this is how papa felt when mother died,” she mumbled to herself as she opened the window for some fresh air before moving on to the next one. It was a nice day out so perhaps some fresh air would help cheer her up. “It’s not the same, I know it isn’t, but I miss Goku already. I can’t imagine what it was like for papa when mom died. If I never saw Goku again… I don’t think my heart could take it.”

It might be a bit dramatic of her to say something like that, but even if she didn’t know him as well as she should have, Chi-Chi couldn’t imagine living in a world without him.

She opened the kitchen window with another a sad sigh. Even in her melancholy state, she couldn’t help but notice that it was a nice sized window that looked like it could be easily climbed through. Chi-Chi shook off that strange thought as her mind turned to much sadder matters.

Thinking about Goku being gone, even though she knew it wouldn’t be for very long, and being alone for so long with nothing but her thoughts led her to thinking about her papa and mother, and what’d happened to the older woman when she herself was less than a year old. It wasn’t really all that unusual for her though, Chi-Chi often found herself thinking about such things whenever she’d been alone for too long.

The spider was sitting on her spice rack, maybe she was projecting but Chi-Chi thought it looked kind of worried about her. “Sorry, being alone sometimes makes me think about my mom and how she died. I know Ms. Matcha said it was because of a hormone imbalance after giving birth. But… The first time I ever heard about how my mother died was when one of dad’s friends got drunk and told me she killed herself because of me.” That might have not been the exact phrasing, but that was the message Chi-Chi had taken away from the man’s drunk ramblings. Not that he kept talking for long after her father caught wind of what he’d been saying. “I know it’s wrong to think that, but sometimes I can’t help it.”

She gave the spider a small smile, feeling a bit better having said it out loud, for the first time ever actually. It felt good to get that off her chest. Especially to something that would just listen without judgement or pity. “Thanks for listening. It’s nice having someone to talk to, I’m glad I brought you in.”

After that, it was surprisingly easy to continue on her daily routine. It wasn’t until lunch had come and gone that she realized that the creepy feeling that’d lingered over the past few days was gone.

With a spring in her step she quickly finished cleaning the rest of the house, opening all the windows as she went along. In what seemed like no time at all her chores were finished and it was time to start cooking dinner.

She actually had a special meal planned for tonight, something that she’d been thinking about off and on during the more relaxed times in the past week. Despite her skill in the kitchen there were a few bits of meat that she didn’t cook up; either because she thought it was too tough or because that kind of meat didn’t fit in with the rest of what she was cooking. This led to several bags of uncooked scraps that were too little to make into an actual meal.

Considering Goku hadn’t been out and about for the past few days he hadn’t been able to hunt and last night they ate up the frozen fish from a few days ago. Tonight, she thought, would be a perfect chance to experiment with the left over scraps. Probably cooked into a stew seeing as some pieces were quite tough.

It’d be a little tricky, considering there were many different types of meat she needed to cook and their flavors all needed to work together, but Chi-Chi liked to think she was up for the challenge. Even if she completely made a mess of it, Goku would probably enjoy eating it anyway.

At least she hoped so.

Her good mood plummeted quite quickly even if her movements didn’t falter. In less than a week she’d gone from confident in her knowledge of how Goku would act to questioning everything she thought she knew about him. Well, maybe not quite to that extreme, but being married to him hadn’t gone nearly how she thought it would.

Chi-Chi just hoped that by the end of next week they’d be as comfortable with each other as they’d been at the start of this week. She sighed, it hadn’t even been a week since their fight, had it? It felt like it’d happened months ago.

The sudden sound of the door opening and closing caught her attention. “Chi-Chi, I’m home!”

“I’m in the kitchen.” She called out, a small smile on her face despite her thoughts on how stressful these last few days had been. Goku sounded happy, he must have had fun training today. Or he’d caught something good. It’d have to wait for tomorrow, unfortunately, considering she was mostly done with cooking tonight’s dinner.

“Smells good.”

“Mhm! I thought I’d cook the leftovers up into a-” She froze as she looked at him. The moment their eyes met she knew for a fact that the person standing in front of her was not Goku, though they shared the same face. Goku would never have such empty and emotionless eyes. Chi-Chi knew, with the certainty that water was wet, that the person in her house wearing her husband’s face was both controlling Goku somehow and that they were going to hurt her.

Without thinking she flung the pot at him and jumped through the open kitchen window. The sound of the stew splashing to the floor and the clang of the pot doing the same followed her out. She ignored it and focused on getting away.

What was going on? How had she known that something had taken control of Goku? More importantly, what could she even do against him while he’s in such a state? She didn’t want to hurt him, Chi-Chi wasn’t even sure if she could, but she couldn’t let whatever was controlling him hurt her either. They may not have known each other for very long, and their relationship might not be the best at the moment, but Chi-Chi was very aware that Goku would never forgive himself if she got seriously hurt by his hand.

Her heart was pounding in her ears as she ran through the trees. She fought back panicked tears as she ran; blurry sight could spell her death.

She tripped on a root that was hidden by the ever growing shadows as the afternoon waned into evening. She rolled with the momentum and sprung up, darting in a different direction than the one she’d been running in. She would swear that she could hear her husband’s now familiar chuckle over her pounding heart. Chi-Chi sucked in another desperate breath and ran faster.

A break in the trees showed a cliff face, but that wasn’t what drew her attention. A black slash stood out on the uneven surface. With desperate hope for a hiding place, she darted to it.

It was a crevice just large enough for her to squeeze through, but absolutely too small for her pursuer. Her newfound hide wasn’t that deep, but hopefully it was enough to put her out of arms reach. She went back as far as she could, jamming her body into the narrow hole and cutting up her exposed arms on the unyielding rocks. She did her best to silence her breathing and mentally prayed to any and every god she could think of that he’d miss where she’d hidden.

She’d ducked into her new hiding spot just in time for the sound of her husband’s voice to ring out behind her.

“Chi-Chi, where are you?” He sing songed out, his voice was light and playful, completely at odds with the empty, almost dead look in his eyes. She forced herself to breathe as silently as possible while he looked around. His eyes, thankfully, passing over her hiding spot without lingering.

He huffed when he couldn’t find her. “Aw come on, Chi-Chi, it’s almost dinner time. We can play hide and seek later, I’m getting hungry.” That sounded so much like her husband it was tempting to just forget about the empty eyes she’d seen him with, but she didn’t move. She couldn’t afford to be caught.

Goku, or at least the thing controlling Goku, looked around the clearing a bit before moving on. It was only after she couldn’t hear him moving through the underbrush that she let out a small sigh of relief. Goku had sharp senses, but clearly whatever was making him do this didn’t have access to them. Still Chi-Chi stayed where she was, not wanting to risk running into him so soon after escaping.

The world grew darker as the evening went on and Chi-Chi didn’t leave the crack she’d found. Instead she used the time bought by her hiding spot to think. What was she supposed to do? There was no way she could beat Goku, not when she knew he could move faster than she could see. The only reason she’d been able to escape like she had was because the thing controlling him was toying with her.

The only one who might have a chance at fighting Goku like this was Piccolo, but that wasn’t someone Chi-Chi would ever go to for help; he wouldn’t bother helping her in the first place and more than that she didn’t want Goku to die. She should go to his friends, though she wasn’t sure they’d believe her if she said Goku was being possessed. If Chi-Chi hadn’t seen his empty eyes, she probably wouldn’t have believed it either.

Chi-Chi also wasn’t so sure she’d be able to forgive herself if Goku was forced to kill his friends. She was certain he wouldn’t forgive himself either.

Regardless, the first thing she absolutely needed to do was to get off the mountain and away from him.

There was no way she could outrun him on foot and while the forest was large enough for her to hide from him while running, that wasn’t a chance she could really afford to take, though she’d likely have to. The Nimbus was also out of the question. Though she didn’t doubt the magical cloud could take her away in seconds, Chi-Chi wasn’t Goku and the Nimbus belonged to him, it wouldn’t come if she called for it. She didn’t have any capsules on her, especially not any vehicles. A part of her wanted to go back home and get the air car but that was too much of a risk.

So despite her misgivings on that plan, her only option would be to run and pray that their paths wouldn’t cross. Now the only question would be when she’d make her break for it. Too soon and she’d run the risk of him not being far enough away. If she waited too long there was a large chance he would have doubled back and be too close anyway.

Indecision and fear kept her in the uncomfortable cliff side well past twilight. The moon had started rising by the time she’d gathered her courage to leave the safe spot she’d found. It didn’t help that her legs were numb from being in one position for hours, she forced herself to stumble forwards though.

Chi-Chi tried her best to be stealthy but it felt like every step she took landed on the loudest twig in the world. She kept moving though, she had to if she wanted to get help for Goku.

A flash of movement out of the corner of her eye caused her to freeze, but she couldn’t see any sign of her husband. She let out a shaky breath. Her fear was getting to her and making her see things.

Still, it couldn’t hurt to be cautious so she shifted her path to better avoid the area she saw that bit of movement in.

It didn’t take long before another bit of unnatural movement, this time she could see what looked like a silhouette of Goku’s head, caught her eye and caused her to change direction again.

The third time it happened a sense of dread settled on her shoulders. The thing in Goku’s body knew where she was and it was herding her somewhere. Though why he’d bother doing that, Chi-Chi didn’t have a clue. With Goku’s speed and strength he could easily take her down without any problem.

The fourth time it happened she ignored it, charging forward with all the speed she could manage and only changing directions when a tree was in the way.

Then he appeared in front of her. She saw him too late and when he was too close for her to change direction in time to avoid him completely so she didn’t even try. Instead she charged right for him. The thing controlling Goku looked smug right up until she punched his face.

It was worse than punching a rock. There was no give to him at all and despite the speed she’d built up and her own, admittedly impressive, strength he didn’t seem affected at all by the blow. However she didn’t have time to linger on how little she’d done to him or the pain in her hand and arm from the strike. Chi-Chi was already moving to deliver a, hopefully debilitating, kick to his stomach.

Again, though, that hit did nothing but send a shock of pain up her leg. Goku was still completely unaffected by it. The only change was the smile on his face turning indulgent.

“Oh? Are we sparring now?” He laughed, “you should have said something!” Goku shifted into a stance she’d never seen before, his legs were wider than they should be and his shoulders were lower than they were in his usual stances, his hands were splayed out like claws and were ready to grab. He’d lowered his head too, the shadows from the moon gave him a much more menacing look.

A shiver went down her spine as she backed up a bit. Menacing was not something she’d ever thought she’d use to describe her husband, but somehow it fit his face disturbingly well.

Still Chi-Chi didn’t retreat, she couldn’t. Not when he’d just chase after her again. So she settled into her own fighting stance. Considering she hadn’t been able to beat him at the tournament, when she knew he’d been holding back, she’d just have to hope that whoever- whatever- was controlling Goku wasn’t as good of a fighter as he was.

He lunged forward, just a little too fast for her to react to, and punched her stomach. The strength behind the blow threw her back and caused bile to rise in her throat. He stood there, waiting for her to finish heaving.

“You’re not very good at this, are you?” He laughed again as she struggled to her feet.

Chi-Chi gritted her teeth but didn’t answer. Judging from his fight with Piccolo, he could easily have punched her hard enough to make her to pass out. Despite the strength in that blow, he was still holding back. Whether it was because Goku was fighting the control or because whatever was in charge was toying with her, she didn’t know though she dearly hoped it was the former. Still, he _was_ holding back and she needed to take advantage of that somehow.

As soon as she’d gotten back into a stance he was on her once again. Punching, kicking, driving her back but never hitting hard enough to knock her down again. Once or twice there were openings that allowed her to strike back, but she may as well have been blowing air onto him.

Then she blocked a particularly hard strike with her left arm when she should have dodged. A crack echoed through her body as she felt her forearm give under his fist and pain spiked through that limb.

Chi-Chi backed away quickly, it wasn’t the first time she’d broken a bone and it felt more like a fracture than a full on break, but she was not about to risk it getting worse.

Goku either noticed her abrupt change of tactics or he’d heard the bone break because he was fully grinning now. “What’s wrong, Chi-Chi? I wasn’t hitting you that hard, was I?”

“Shut up!” She snarled, “stop acting like that! You’re not Goku!”

At her words his grin dropped. His face went as emotionless and blank as his eyes were. “Oh? What do you mean, Chi-Chi?” His expression morphed to something that might have been innocent if not for the way his eyes stayed empty. “You’ve been acting weird tonight, first you waste dinner by throwing it at me,” he plucked at his now stained gi for emphasis, “then you want to play hide and seek, then you want to spar and now you’re mad.” He tilted his head to the side in apparent confusion. “I just don’t get it.”

“Stop playing around! I _know_ you’re not Goku, I can see it in your eyes!”

He blinked before snapping his fingers in realization. “Ah, you must be tired of this, that’s why you’re not playing well.” He gave a wide toothy smile, big enough to almost make his eyes close. “Tell you what, this time I’ll give you a head start. You can do _anything_ you want for five minutes and I won’t move from this spot. Doesn’t that sound fun?” He crossed his arms. “But you gotta promise that after this we’ll have dinner, okay? I really am getting hungry.”

“What?”

Goku laughed again, “didn’t you hear me? You have five minutes to do anything you want before I can move from this spot.”

Chi-Chi took a step back. Five minutes wasn’t a long time, probably not enough time for her to get away from him. Still, if he was being honest, it was a chance and one she’d have to take. She turned and sprinted away, the sound of his laughter ringing in her ears.

The trees whizzed by her as she went as fast as she could. Chi-Chi didn’t actually know where she was going, and she didn’t really care so long as it was away from the thing controlling Goku.

She was only half surprised when she made it to a familiar looking cliff side. Considering how often Goku made her change direction as well as her lack of familiarity with the area she kind of figured she’d be going in a circle. Unfortunately she doubted the small crack in the rock was going to be much help this time.

Neither would the cliff itself. Chi-Chi didn’t have the breath to spare for cursing, though she dearly wanted to, as she changed directions to run parallel to the natural wall. The cliff was only slowing her down and cutting the distance she could put between herself and the thing controlling her husband. Even if she could scale the cliff in less than five minutes, Goku could climb it just as easily as she could.

A flash of movement caught her eye and she instinctively turned to face it, the back of her head was then abruptly slammed into the cliff side and she saw stars.

Shaking her head to clear it, she became aware of a few things; firstly that shaking her head had been a really bad idea if the increased throbbing was any indication. The next was that though her feet were still on the ground she couldn’t quite seem to stand fully on it, only the balls of her feet and her toes were in contact with the earth. The third was a muted pain in her left shoulder.

The fourth thing she noticed was Goku’s power pole sticking out of that very same shoulder, pinning her to the rock wall.

Time felt like it was standing still, Chi-Chi couldn’t hear anything other than a dull roar in her ears.

She took a deep shuddering breath and that feeling vanished instantly. Chi-Chi screamed and grabbed at both the pole and her shoulder with her good hand as pain crashed down on her.

Goku’s disappointed sigh was lost amongst her screams but his words were not. “I’m bored now,” he stepped out of the shadows the trees made and into the moonlight, his movements unhurried and predatory like.

“Wa-what?” Chi-Chi gasped, clinging at the pole impaled in her shoulder. She could only stare as the thing wearing her husband’s face approached.

“I’m _bored_. You’re boring me. Then again, I’m not sure what I expected.” He shook his head in mock disappointment. “Your mother didn’t find it worthwhile to stick around, did she? Why else would she leave like that? You couldn’t keep your father from going crazy, probably because of how horrible you are. You’re not even worth entertainment. Then again, that’s not all you’ve failed at, is it?”

Despite her pain she scrambled to get away. It was impossible though considering she was pinned to the cliff side with the bright red staff. “Get away!” She tried kicking at him, but her blows were completely ignored, not that she could put much force into her attack considering her position.

He roughly grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at his empty eyes. She shuddered at the touch, it felt like spiders were crawling on her skin. “They were probably right,” his voice was soft, “when they said she died because of you. How disappointing do you have to be, for your mother to kill herself before you’re even a year old? It was probably because you were so noisy. You still are.” He pitched his voice higher and shriller in a mocking imitation of her. “‘Goku, let’s talk about this,’ ‘Goku do that,’ ‘Goku listen to me.’ We haven’t been together a month and I’m already sick of hearing you talk. Then there’s how much you’ve let even your own father down.”

It wasn’t him. She told herself as tears ran down her face. Whatever else was going on, this person was _not_ Goku. She’d never so much as mentioned her mother around him so Goku could not possibly know anything about her death. However, hearing her secret fears being said in his voice hurt just as much as the staff in her shoulder did.

“How hard is it, to set aside your own wants for the man who raised you? All he wanted was for you to take over after he was gone. But no. You wanted to be a _housewife_. You wanted to live it up while your husband worked hard. All you want to sit around and do _nothing_ while making me do all the work.” He sneered, “you wanted to be a wife but you couldn’t even manage to do _that_ right. What kind of failure of a wife are you? I don’t want to talk to you, I don’t want to be near you: I won’t even sleep in the same room as you!”

Chi-Chi started sobbing in earnest now. Even knowing it couldn’t possibly be her husband behind those empty eyes and cruel words, she couldn’t deny that there was some truth to what he was saying. Though she’d never told him about her insecurities involving her father; Goku _had_ been avoiding her for a while now, and looking back it was painfully obvious. And while she wouldn’t say that keeping a house was easy, he was right in that she was pushing her expectations on what Goku should be doing as a husband rather than what he actually wanted to do.

A flash of white teeth caught her eye as he smirked. “Well, I can’t say you’ve failed at _everything_. The one thing you’ve always managed to do is fill my belly!”

She wasn’t sure if it was instinct or luck that caused her good arm to be in the right place, all Chi-Chi knew was that it was the only reason why his teeth didn’t sink into her neck. She screamed as he ripped a chunk off her arm and started chewing. She screamed as he swallowed and licked his lips and she screamed some more when he grabbed that arm and took another bite.

Her cries got cut off when he forced her mouth shut with the hand still on her jaw. “What did I tell you about being so noisy?” He purred into her ear. “For someone so caught up on manners, you’re very rude.”

Chi-Chi could smell her blood on his breath. All she could do was whimper and squirm despite the constant burning pain in her shoulder, she needed to get away from him. He chuckled at her actions and licked under her ear, nibbling gently on the lobe. “As much as I’d love to eat you up,” his voice was deep and rough. Hadn’t she thought, not even a week ago, that she’d wanted to hear him talk to her like that? That thought almost made her laugh despite the pain and fear coursing through her. Was this a lesson in being careful what she wished for? Why was she thinking of such things now? Was she in shock?

His grip on her jaw tightened as he pulled her forward, bringing her scattered thoughts back to the present. Distantly she realized she hadn’t heard what he’d been saying, but in all honesty it probably didn’t matter. The thing with her husband’s face was going to kill her. Unless the real Goku took back his body, there wasn’t anything she could do, was there? Considering what’d just happened though, she didn’t think he could get control back.

All she could do was whimper as she was pulled off Goku’s power pole. Her shoulder throbbed as blood began flowing freely from the hole that was now in it. He chuckled before leaning forward and lapping at the blood. Only his grip on her jaw kept her standing through the pain.

Despite his hand keeping her looking straight ahead as he licked at her, her eyes caught a glint of something sticking out of the back of his neck. He pulled back and dropped her before she could figure out what it was.

“Get up.” He wiped his mouth and licked the blood off of it. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

Her vision was starting to blur, she didn’t know if it was from tears or blood loss. She did her best to push it back and do as the thing with Goku’s face said though. Even if she was going to die anyway, Chi-Chi didn’t want to know what would happen if he lost his temper. He smirked at her obedience and turned to walk away, expecting her to follow.

There was a needle stuck into the base of his skull. It was thin and didn’t look like any sort of needle she’d ever seen before. Chi-Chi wouldn’t have even noticed it if not for the waning moonlight. She didn’t know if that was the thing controlling her husband or if it was left over from whatever took his body, she just knew that it had to go.

Gritting her teeth, she pushed aside the words he’d said before. Now wasn’t the time to wallow in emotional hurt. Not when something was using Goku to hurt others. Not when Goku, assuming he’d remember, would be in so much worse emotional pain later.

Considering she couldn’t move her left arm at all and her right was missing a few chunks, she couldn’t move either hand fast or with great strength. Chi-Chi would need him to be distracted and prone. She could recall his tail had been his weakness when they were young, surely where it’d been was just as vulnerable now. She didn’t know if the thing controlling Goku could feel his pain or not, but striking at his weak point was the only thing she could do right now.

She sent up a silent thanks to Kami that Goku was not at all shy about being naked around people, or else she wouldn’t have known just where to strike. Chi-Chi would only get one shot and it would have to be dead on. With a deep fortifying breath, she charged.

With as much power and precision she was capable of, she kicked at the spot his tail had been.

Much to her relief, he made a choked gasping noise as his legs gave out. Chi-Chi wasted no time in grabbing the needle and, using a foot braced against his back, yanked it out. Using the momentum she rolled away from him and took off running. The sound of retching followed her, but she ignored it. She didn’t know if taking out the needle would bring Goku back right away, but she couldn’t take the risk of hanging around to see.

So she ran blindly. Even if she was only staving off the inevitable, it meant she’d be alive for that much longer. Despite the adrenaline pumping through her body, her arms were a throbbing mess of pain and it wasn’t long before she lost focus and tripped.

Chi-Chi lay there, sprawled out on the forest floor and bleeding out from the holes in her arms. She didn’t want to move. It felt like she was floating and spinning though she knew she wasn’t moving at all. It made her dizzy. She had to get up though. She had to keep moving or else Goku was going to find and eat her. If he remembered, if he was aware of what was happening, he’d be horrified. She couldn’t do that to him.

A glint caught her eye again. She’d dropped the needle when she’d fallen. Dully, she watched it as it caught the moonlight. It was moving, she realized. Her gaze sharpened as she focused on it, it was trying to go somewhere. Goku had been trying to take her somewhere too.

They were trying to get to the same place.

That thought popped into her head, and Chi-Chi couldn’t help but believe it was true. Like with how she’d known Goku was possessed rather than replaced.

She didn’t take her eyes off the needle as she sat up. It hurt like hell, but she took her belt off and tied it around her bad shoulder to at least try and stave off bleeding out. Her body was tingling and her wounds didn’t hurt as much though she figured it was from more adrenaline pumping in her body.

Picking up the needle, now that she was paying attention, she could feel the small slight movements of it trying to get back to wherever it’d come from. Chi-Chi gritted her teeth and forced herself to stand. Whatever, whoever, it was that tried to force Goku into hurting her was going to regret trying.

With her focus on the needle she managed to spot a thin gossamer strand connecting the needle with wherever it was that was trying to bring it back. With another deep shuddering breath, she followed it, full of grim determination.

Chi-Chi could acknowledge that she hadn’t been the best wife for Goku. But in this, at least, she wasn’t going to fail him. Even if it killed her.

After all, it seemed like it was the least she could do, considering Goku had done so much for her, and everyone really, when he defeated Piccolo Jr. not too long ago. He’d done it after being shot through the chest and having all his limbs broken too. Compared to that, an impaled shoulder and a few bite marks weren’t worth anything, were they?

And that had only been what she’d seen. From what little he’d told her so far, he’d done as much for others before. That he’d gotten hurt and put his life on the line for the sake of others.

It was about time someone did the same for him.

She lengthened her stride to a ground eating jog as she went deeper into the forest, determination fueling her as she followed the thin thread and the slight twitches of the needle.

Chi-Chi didn’t know how long she ran for, and to be frank she didn’t _care_ , but her legs and lungs were burning by the time she made it to what looked like an ancient stone temple built out of a cliff and half hidden by a rushing waterfall. From what she could see it was large and ominous and it was something Chi-Chi would have been perfectly happy with not going anywhere near. There was the broken remains of a large bolder scattered around the opening, it looked like something had broken it from the inside. She didn’t want to know what kind of beast could break a bolder that big. The needle of course, was leading her straight through the door.

The entryway was covered in cobwebs and from what she could see in the dim light, the webbing was only going to get thicker further on inside. While she might not mind one or two spiders making their nest in her home, the amount of spiders needed to make that many webs made her shiver and her skin feel cold. Though that might have been the blood loss catching up to her.

Still, she’d gotten this far. There was no point in chickening out now. After a brief moment to catch her breath and lament the lack of a flashlight she entered the spider ridden building. A part of her was wondering where Goku was; he was so much faster than she was, surely he should have caught up to her by now? Maybe she’d hurt him worse than she thought? Or perhaps he didn’t want to deal with this anymore? Or maybe he was watching her and waiting for his time to strike. She shook that particular thought away. Goku wasn’t here right now, and as worried as she was about her husband she couldn’t afford to be distracted.

The hall was dark, yet inexplicably light enough for her to see where she was going. A part of her wanted to think it was because her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, but she doubted that was the case. Her doubts were proven correct when she made it to a junction, the needle was leading down a hall that was distinctly lighter than the other two.

The webs seem to be getting bigger as she got further in, yet they weren’t in the way of her path. Chi-Chi wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. She hadn’t seen any actual spiders either. Whether it was from the dim light hiding them or if they’d died out, she didn’t know. Chi-Chi wasn’t sure she actually cared. But the strands of the webs looked like they were getting thicker as well and it left her with a really bad feeling.

The hall led to a large web covered room. There were some bright points near the ceiling, web covered lights it looked like, giving the room an eerie yellowish glow. She didn’t have time to take in the rest of the area though, as the needle was roughly torn from her hand, drawing blood from a thin scratch it’d made from its rough movement.

“Well, well, what have we here?” A high, crackly and creaky voice sounded out. Chi-Chi tucked her useless arm close to herself and settled into a fighting stance as a large dark figure emerged from a corner. “A tiny little morsel, is it?”

Despite herself, Chi-Chi couldn’t help but take a step back when the figure had emerged enough for her to get a good look at it.

The creature was easily the size of her father, it loomed over her and Chi-Chi couldn’t understand how she hadn’t seen it when she’d first entered the room. It had a spider’s body, but where the head should be was the torso of an emaciated human covered in a patchwork of chitin. Despite the very human looking face, eight eyes gleamed wickedly at her while large sharp mandibles protruded from the mouth. Its fingers were long and spindly like its legs and ended in wicked looking claws. It carefully took the needle that was now in its hand and twirled the thin object around in its fingers.

“How nice,” the spider creature continued, its mouth opened to reveal sharp teeth, “that you would come here willingly.” It sighed forlornly, “though I did enjoy having my little puppet; he screamed so beautifully when he was mine.” A few of its eyes looked at the needle, the rest stayed locked on Chi-Chi. “Perhaps I could let him be my puppet again, wouldn’t that be nice?”

“Don’t touch him!” This was the thing that had taken over Goku. She knew that with the same certainty and clarity that she’d known Goku wasn’t in charge of his own body. Chi-Chi didn’t know how it did it, she honestly didn’t care, but she was not going to let it take over him again.

The spider thing scoffed. “How arrogant, ordering the magnificent me around. Just like your forbearers, trapping me in here, sealing the exit,” it smirked now, “at least until a foolish little morsel like yourself came along and set me free.”

It started creeping towards her as she backed up. As much as Chi-Chi wanted to entirely focus on the creature, there was no way she could possibly do anything to it without a weapon of some sort, not in her current state at least. However, the only thing she could see in the room was webbing. “I’ve never been in this part of the mountain. And I would _never_ let anything like you free.” She’d nearly backed up to the hallway now. As much as she wanted to turn and run back to the entrance, Chi-Chi had a bad feeling that if the spider creature were to leave the building it’d get Goku again.

So with great reluctance she shifted so her back was to the wall rather than the door as the spider thing continued. “Oh but you did, little morsel. How naughty of you,” it wagged a long spindly finger in a scolding manner, “allowing your untouched body to linger on this mountain during the full moon.”

The full moon again? Chi-Chi couldn’t help but think. Why was everyone so caught up on the full moon? “Goku’s lived here most of his life, and I’m sure others have too. He would have heard of an evil spider monster.” As much as she really didn’t want to start up a conversation with the thing that made Goku hurt her, Chi-Chi wanted to stall in the hopes that she’d come up with a plan.

The spider cackled and Chi-Chi used its laughter as a distraction to put more distance between herself and it. “Oh, but my dear puppet does not have your power tainted bloodline.”

“There’s nothing special about my family.” Despite the moniker her dad went by and his appearance, the Demon Ox King was not, in fact, any of those things. Her mom wasn’t anything more than human either, as far as Chi-Chi knew. 

Her response was only met with more laughter. “You don’t know, do you morsel? Oh how fitting that such a thing should be as forgotten as I have been!” It grinned at her, its lips stretching far too wide for its human like face. “Oh, but don’t worry, I won’t leave you to rot in obscurity as I have. You’ll be the first meal I’ve had in over a hundred years!” With that it lunged forwards.

Chi-Chi tried to scramble out of the way, but like before with Goku she was just a little too slow. Her scream echoed out as the creature’s sharp teeth and nails sank into her leg. Despite how much she thrashed it wouldn’t let go and continued to chew on her until she jammed her fingers in its eyes. It shrieked and backed off clutching at its face as blood welled through its fingers, Chi-Chi tried not to think about how human its eyes were and how it felt sticking her fingers in them.

Her leg felt like it was on fire and she was fairly certain she couldn’t walk anymore. Still, she did her best to back away.

“You’ll regret that, morsel! You’re _dead_!” It gently removed its hand from its face, showing that Chi-Chi had managed to blind three of its eyes. Then the spider demon surged forwards again, grabbing her jaw and slamming her into the floor. For a horrible moment Chi-Chi thought she was back in the woods with Goku grabbing her there as he ate her. She could practically hear his voice even now. She weakly grabbed at its hands with her one good one, but she couldn’t even begin to try and free herself.

The spider monster didn’t bite at her again, though there was nothing she could have done to stop it if it had, it just snarled into her face showing off its blood soaked teeth and mandibles. “It doesn’t matter how much you struggle now, _morsel_ , you’ll be dead no matter what. I’ll enjoy hearing you scream as my wondrous venom dissolves you from the inside!”

A shout sounded out that came from neither Chi-Chi nor the spider demon. Before either could so much as try looking for the source a blinding beam of light slammed into the spider, throwing it away from Chi-Chi.

She couldn’t help but cry out once again as its claws raked across her face and head as it was torn away from her. Luckily it missed her eyes, but despite that Chi-Chi couldn’t really see what was going on. Between the blood on her face and the amount of blood she’d lost over all, everything around her was little more than a blur. Her ears were ringing but the fading screams of the spider monster were impossible to mistake or ignore as it was blasted away. They were cut off with an astonishing loud splat and an out of focus figure approached her.

The ringing in her ears had changed to a roar and the pain in her leg had gotten worse and was starting to spread. However, despite that pain, panic took over her and she began to struggle as the person got closer.

It was Goku.

Chi-Chi couldn’t afford for the thing controlling him to get her again. Not when she was far too injured to escape. Not when it’d mean Goku would have to live with the consequences.

She might have screamed as she backed away from his approaching figure, but honestly everything hurt too much for her to tell. She could hear his voice though she couldn’t make out any of the words he was saying, that was probably a good thing considering the sort of things that spider thing had made him tell her.

Another blurred figure rose up from behind Goku. Was it the spider demon?

Chi-Chi couldn’t handle both at once. She couldn’t even really handle _one_. Goku abruptly disappeared and Chi-Chi had to clench her eyes shut as bright lights began flashing. Shouts were muffled by the way her ears were roaring. That didn’t stop the high, shrill shriek from piercing through the fog surrounding her brain.

Abrupt silence and darkness caused her to force her eyes open. Goku was in front of her once again. He was covered in blood but his eyes were alive in a way they hadn’t been all evening.

“Gok-” Her throat hurt from all the screaming she’d done and now that she knew Goku was himself again, all the other injuries she’d been ignoring seemed determined to make her pay attention to them, especially her arms.

It didn’t help that Goku was carrying her now. Chi-Chi didn’t know when that happened, just that they were suddenly moving. His steps, though smooth and even, kept jarring her body and she couldn’t help but whimper at the pain.

“It’s okay, Chi-Chi. You’re going to be okay. I promise.” His voice was soft but urgent and it sounded like there was a whine overlapping his words. Goku looked like he was going to cry, something she’d never thought she’d see when it came to him. She just couldn’t imagine him crying. The only time he raised his voice was to call for the Nimbus.

Chi-Chi couldn’t enjoy the smoother ride of the cloud though. Not when the burning pain in her leg had spread to her stomach. Chi-Chi was dimly aware that her cries and whimpers were getting louder, but there was little she could do to stop herself from making those sounds.

It felt like her insides were on fire and even breathing was starting to hurt. The pain just seemed to grow in both intensity and the area that hurt. Nothing she did seemed to help, not that she could do much to begin with; she could just barely manage to breathe.

Their flight was a blur. For the most part, it didn’t actually feel like she was flying at all. She couldn’t feel the wind against her skin; it felt numb compared to the pain in the rest of her body. The only reminder was when Goku would encourage the cloud to go faster.

The longer they flew the more the pain crept up her body and the harder it was for her to breathe. It felt like she was dying. She probably was, Chi-Chi just wished she’d die faster so that the pain would stop. Dimly, over the rushing wind and roaring in her ears, she could hear Goku’s panicked babbling, though the words faded in and out of her understanding.

“- say that! You’re going to be _fine_!” It was funny, she hadn’t thought he’d ever sound so scared. Not even when he was on the ground with a hole in his chest from fighting Piccolo did he ever sound so scared or uncertain. “Almost… okay! … don’t … me alone!”

Chi-Chi didn’t like seeing him so scared and sad. It sounded like he was crying too? She wasn’t sure, but she could hear the desperation in his voice. She didn’t want him to beg for things, not from her. So she mustered her rapidly diminishing strength to try and push back the pain.

That tingling feeling from before was back. She hadn’t realized it was gone before, it almost seemed like it was slowing down that burning feeling creeping along her chest.

It still hurt to breathe, but now it felt like there was something clogging her throat and Goku’s voice was sounding more and more panicked though she could no longer make out the words. She wanted to stay awake, to comfort Goku because none of this was his fault and he shouldn’t sound so scared. However her eyes drifted shut without her consent.

“ _Korin_!” That was the last desperate shout she’d managed to hear before pain overwhelmed her and her mind sank into nothingness.


End file.
